The Billion Dollar Spy

Waterstones Non-Fiction Book of the Month for August 2018 ‘An astonishingly detailed picture of espionage in the 1980s, written with pacey journalistic verve and an eerily contemporary feel. Essential reading for anyone who wants to know how the spy mind works.’ Ben Macinytre, The Times January, 1977. While the chief of the CIA's Moscow station fills his gas tank, a stranger drops a note into the car. In the years that followed, that stranger, Adolf Tolkachev, became one of the West's most valuable spies. At enormous risk Tolkachev and his handlers conducted clandestine meetings across Moscow, using spy cameras, props, and private codes to elude the KGB in its own backyard - until a shocking betrayal put them all at risk. Derived from recently declassified intelligence, Pulitzer-winner David E. Hoffman masterfully prises open the heartless chill of the Cold War in The Billion Dollar Spy; a brilliant feat of reporting and a riveting true story. Hoffman’s real skill is in turning the details of archive research into page-turning prose as compelling as any work of espionage fiction. The book is packed with riveting details about the minutiae of spy-craft alongside insights into the heart-stopping tension of life undercover in 1980’s Moscow. Soon to be a major new film, directed by Amma Asante, Hoffman’s book unlocks the psychology of a secret service operative, giving unprecedented access to the life of the CIA’s greatest Kremlin insider.